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During the period 1989–1997 when David Pollardwas coeditor, the journal had the strongest editorial lineupin its history. The two editors were backed up by twoexperienced colleagues — Janice Wickeri and Chu Chiyu— who brought with them impressive linguistic and culturalknowledge. Pollard, with a background in ChineseStudies, joining Hung in Translation Studies formed aunique editorial team. This combination of two perspectivesgenerated new ideas for special issues and interestingdebates on a variety of subjects ranging from thecontents of the journal to different editorial commentsabout translation approaches and styles. A showcase of aspecial issue by this unique editorial team is RenditionsNos. 53 & 54 (2000), “Chinese Impressions of theWest,” which presents the experience and observations ofthose who had journeyed to the West in the 19th century,as well as the impressions and opinions of those who hadnever been outside of China.In addition to the journal, Renditions also publishes ahard-cover and a paperback series. The hard-cover serieswas introduced in 1976 by Kao and Soong, primarily forthe library market, which shows that the discipline ofChinese Studies in the west was recognized as a corereadership for Renditions. In 1986, a paperback seriesaimed at making high-quality translations available to awider market was introduced. This series, with anemphasis on contemporary writers, is often used as classroommaterial by teachers of Chinese and Asian surveycourses in the West, but it also attracts a general readership.Titles in the hard-cover and paperback series haveaccumulated to seventeen and twenty-six, respectively. Aspecial new product introduced in 2002 is the RenditionsPDA series, sold directly on-line, featuring poetry selectionsand city stories, especially chosen for readers interestedin China or traveling to Asia. It offers them a tasteof Greater China through her literature.“Whatever we have achieved in the last few years andmay achieve in the future is a reflection of the inspirationwe draw from George Kao and Stephen Soong, thefounding editors. The torches they held high still lightthe way for us who follow in their footsteps,” wrote EvaHung in 1990. Building on the legacy, the different editorshave each brought in their share of innovation toRenditions while maintaining its cultural mission. In thepresent electronic days, Renditions publications have alsobeen made available on CD-Rom and in PDA format,new developments that would not have been part of theearly dream.ReferencesHung, Eva. “The Research Centre for Translation: AMirror of Translation Studies in Hong Kong.” InTranslation in Hong Kong: Past, Present andFuture. Chan Sin-wai, ed. Hong Kong: ChineseUniversity Press, 2001.———. “Periodicals as Anthologies: A Study of ThreeEnglish-Language Journals of Chinese Literature.”In International Anthologies of Literature inTranslation. Harald Kittel, ed. Berlin: ErichSchmidt, 1995.———. The Renditions Experience 1973–2003 Ed.Hong Kong: The Research Centre for Translation,The Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2003Kao, George. “Editing a Chinese-English TranslationMagazine.” In The Art and Profession ofTranslation. T.C. Lai, ed. Hong Kong: Hong KongTranslation Society, 1975.Renditions, Nos. 1–60, 1973–2003.Research Centre for Translation, Annual Reports1986–present.Footnotes1Book review by Si Qian in The China Times, Taipei, 20February 1975, referred to by Kao in his article “Editinga Chinese-English Translation Magazine.”2The Renditions Experience 1973–2003, ed. Eva Hung.(Hong Kong: The Research Centre for Translation, TheChinese University of Hong Kong, 2003), p. 533The Renditions Experience 1973–2003, p. 374China Quarterly, Vol. 118, June 1989, p. 378.5The San Francisco Review of Books, Feb/Mar 1994, pp.24–25.Translation Review 33
WHISPERED URGENCY: TRANSLATING SOUND AND MOMENTUMIN RAFFAELLO BALDINI’S “E’ MALÀN”By Adria BernardiWhen I first had the opportunity to hear RaffaelloBaldini read his poetry aloud, I heard something Ihad not heard in my own reading of them, a whisperedurgency, and because of this I had slowed the pace of hispoems too much. When I had a second opportunity tohear him read, including the poem “E’ malàn,” I againheard this whispered urgency. What I also heard washow phrases and images accumulated, one after theother, with no respite; there was seemingly no pause forbreath as he read, which gave the poem simultaneouslyboth nearly unbearable weight and incredible headlongmovement.“E’ malàn” (1) is made up of just such an accumulation,and what accumulates is noise. For the narrator,this accumulation of sounds is a barrage, an overwhelmingdin, which becomes transformed at the end of thepoem. It is Baldini’s layering, together with a poetic languagethat mimics spoken conversation, which give thispoem both weight and momentum. You arrive at the endhaving heard or spoken words with edges and gnarls andspikes; you arrive at the end of the poem out of breath.In the introduction to Baldini’s collection, Ad nòta(Nighttime), Pier Vincenzo Mengaldo begins: “Were itnot for the lazy prejudices still alive that relegate a poetwriting in dialect as ‘minor,’ even when he’s major,Raffaello Baldini would be considered. . . one of thethree or four most important poets in Italy.” (2)This salvo raises what tends to be the first questionin any discussion of the poet’s work, as it is in discussingthe works of those who write in a dialect: Why dialect?“But who’s going to understand your dialect?” he isasked in a collegeal interview by critic Franco Brevini.“What are the motivations for this choice?”(3) he isasked in another interview.“It’s probably an inevitable question,” Baldini concedes.“To which there can be more than one answer,including, ‘I don’t know,’ which seems like a nonresponse,but it isn’t.”(4)Like poetry written in other regional dialects,Baldini’s poetic language is fundamentally oral. In thesame interview, he says, “Well, for me the essence of thedialect, at least for me, is orality, . . . it’s an oral animal.”(5) It is, he reminds the interviwer, a language that didnot have an extensive written tradition until 1946, whenTonino Guerra’s groundbreaking, I scarabócc,(Scribblings) (6) was published. Along with Guerra(1920) and Nino Pedretti (1923), Baldini is one a “trio”of poets to write in romognala dialect and who share originsin Santarcangelo di Romagna, a town near Rimini.Born in 1924, Baldini was a journalist for many years forPanomama, where he wrote extensively about religion.All of his poetry and each of his three theatrical monologuesare written in romognola. (7)In reading the poem, “E’ malàn,” (Noise) one canbegin to see and hear some of the differences betweenthe sounds of Baldini’s romagnolo and standard Italian.In romognola, as in in other dialects, words end in a consonantwith great frequency. The effect of this dominanceof consonant-ending words is evident from thebeginning with the title. E’ malàn has a clipped, rushedsound. Il rumore is softer and slightly more elongated.E’ malàn is spoken with impatience, while il rumore, tomy ear, is a word that cannot be rushed in quite the sameway.From the beginning of the poem:E’ malànU i à da ès un pòstdvò ch’e’ va réss tótt e’ malàn de mònd,pr’aria, d’in èlt, chi sa, o alazò in fònd,mo dalòngh, ch’u n’i pò rivé niseun,una gònga, cmè un gòurgh, mo svérs, un mèr,che da ’d fura u n s vaid gnént, però avsinés,s’u s putéss,te préim u s sintirébb un sbruntlaméntcmè quant i bumbardéva vérs maréina,pu a fès piò sòtta, sl’òural,mè a dèggh ch’ l’à d’avnì fura un batibói,un diavuléri, che par no inzurléiséun u s chin mètt al dàidi tagli urècci, . . (p. 118,ll. 1-13)This is the Italian, which the poet himself translated:Ci dev’essere un posto / dove va a finire tutto ilrumore del mondo, / per aria, in alto, chi sa, o laggiú infondo, / ma lontano, che non ci può arrivare nessuno, /una conca, come una gora, ma immensa, un mare, / che34 Translation Review
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Page 42 and 43: ON THE CATHAY TOUR WITH ELIOT WEINB
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Page 72 and 73: THE MEXICAN POET HOMERO ARIDJISBy R
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Page 80 and 81: Street of Lost FootstepsBy Lyonel T

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